Complete Works of Ford Madox Ford, page 157
It was on the day on which her uncle Norfolk had sent for her that the King had his interview with the heretical Dr Barnes — nicknamed Antoninus Anglicanus.
The Lady Mary and Katharine Howard and her maid, Margot, were set in a tiny closet in which there was, in a hole in the wall, a niche for the King’s confessor. The King’s own chamber was empty when they passed through, and they left the door between ajar. There came a burst of voices, and swiftly the Bishop of Winchester himself entered their closet. He lifted his black eyebrows at sight of them, and rubbed his thin hands with satisfaction.
‘Now we shall hear one of Crummock’s henchmen swinged,’ he whispered. He raised a finger for them to lend ear and gazed through the crack of the door. They heard a harsh voice, like a dog’s bay, utter clearly:
‘Now goodly goodman Doctor, thou hast spoken certain words at Paul’s Cross. They touched on Justification; thou shalt justify them to me now.’ There came a sound of a man who cleared his throat — and then again the heavy voice:
‘Why, be not cast down; we spoke as doctor to doctor. Without a doubt thou art learned. Show then thy learning. Wast brave at Paul’s Cross. Justify now!’
Gardiner, turning from gazing through the door-crack, grinned at the three women.
‘He rated me at Paul’s Cross!’ he said. ‘He thumped me as I had been a thrashing floor.’ They missed the Doctor’s voice — but the King’s came again.
‘Why, this is a folly. I am Supreme Head, but I bid thee to speak.’
There was a long pause till they caught the words.
‘Your Highness, I do surrender my learning to your Highness’.’ Then, indeed, there was a great roar:
‘Unworthy knave; surrender thyself to none but God. He is above me as above thee. To none but God.’
There was another long silence, and then the King’s voice again:
‘Why, get thee gone. Shalt to gaol for a craven....’ And then came a hissing sound of vexation, a dull thud, and other noises.
The King’s bonnet lay on the floor, and the King himself alone was padding down the room when they opened their door. His face was red with rage.
‘Why, what a clever fiend is this Cromwell!’ the Lady Mary said; but the Bishop of Winchester was laughing. He pushed Margot Poins from the closet, but caught Katharine Howard tightly by the arm.
‘Thou shalt write what thy uncle asked of thee!’ he commanded in a low voice, ‘an thou do it not, thy cousin shall to gaol! I have a letter thou didst write me.’
A black despair settled for a moment upon Katharine, but the King was standing before her. He had walked with inaudible swiftness up from the other end of the room.
‘Didst not hear me argue!’ he said, with the vexation of a great child. ‘That poxy knave out-marched me!’
‘Why,’ the Lady Mary sniggered at him, ‘thy brewer’s son is too many for your Highness.’
Henry snarled round at her; but she folded her hands before her and uttered:
‘The brewer’s son made your Highness Supreme Head of the Church. Therefore, the brewer’s son hath tied your Highness’ tongue. For who may argue with your Highness?’
He looked at her for a moment with a bemused face.
‘Very well,’ he said.
‘The brewer’s son should have made your Highness the lowest suppliant at the Church doors. Then, if, for the astounding of certain beholders, your Highness were minded to argue, your Highness should find adversaries.’
The bitter irony of her words made Katharine Howard angry. This poor, heavy man had other matters for misgiving than to be badgered by a woman. But the irony was lost upon the King. He said very simply:
‘Why, that is true. If I be the Head, the Tail shall fear to bandy words with me.’ He addressed himself again to Katharine: ‘I am sorry that you did not hear me argue. I am main good at these arguments.’ He looked reflectively at Gardiner and said: ‘Friend Winchester, one day I will cast a main at arguments with thee, and Kat Howard shall hear. But I doubt thou art little skilled with thy tongue.’
‘Why, I will make a better shift with my tongue than Privy Seal’s men dare,’ the bishop said. He glanced under his brows at Henry, as if he were measuring the ground for a leap.
‘The Lady Mary is in the right,’ he ventured.
The King, who was thinking out a speech to Katharine, said, ‘Anan?’ and Gardiner ventured further:
‘I hold it for true that this man held his peace, because Cromwell so commanded it. He is Cromwell’s creature, and Cromwell is minded to escape from the business with a whole skin.’
The King bent him an attentive ear.
‘It is to me, in the end, that Privy Seal owes amends,’ Gardiner said rancorously. ‘Since it was at me that this man, by Cromwell’s orders, did hurl his foul words at Paul’s Cross.’
The King said:
‘Why, it is true that thou art more sound in doctrine than is Privy Seal. What wouldst thou have?’
Gardiner made an immense gesture, as if he would have embraced the whole world.
Katharine Howard trembled. Here they were, all the three of them Cromwell’s enemies. They were all alone with the King in a favouring mood, and she was on the point of crying out:
‘Give us Privy Seal’s head.’
But, in this very moment of his opportunity, Gardiner faltered. Even the blackness of his hatred could not make him bold.
‘That he should make me amends in public for the foul words that knave uttered. That they should both sue to me for pardon: that it should be showed to the world what manner of man it is that they have dared to flout.’
‘Why, goodman Bishop, it shall be done,’ the King said, and Katharine groaned aloud. A clock with two quarter boys beside the large fireplace chimed the hour of four.
‘Aye!’ the King commented to Katharine. ‘I thought to have had a pleasanter hour of it. Now you see what manner of life is mine: I must go to a plaguing council!’
‘An I were your Highness,’ Katharine cried, ‘I would be avenged on them that marred my pleasures.’
He touched her benevolently upon the cheek.
‘Sweetheart,’ he said, ‘an thou wert me thou’dst do great things.’ He rolled towards the door, heavy and mountainous: with the latch in his hand, he cried over his shoulder: ‘But thou shalt yet hear me argue!’
‘What a morning you have made of this!’ Katharine threw at the bishop. The Lady Mary shrugged her shoulders to her ears and turned away. Gardiner said:
‘Anan?’
‘Oh, well your Holiness knows,’ Katharine said. ‘You might have come within an ace of having Cromwell down.’
His eyes flashed, and he swallowed with a bitter delight.
‘I have him at my feet,’ he said. ‘He shall do public reparation to me. You have heard the King say so.’
There were tears of vexation in Katharine’s eyes.
‘Well I know how it is that this brewer’s son has king’d it so long!’ she said. ‘An I had been a man it had been his head or mine.’
Gardiner shook himself like a dog that is newly out of the water.
‘Madam Howard,’ he said, ‘you are mighty high. I have observed how the King spoke all his words for your ear. His passions are beyond words and beyond shame.’
The Lady Mary was almost out of the room, and he came close enough to speak in Katharine’s ears.
‘But be you certain that his Highness’ passions are not beyond the reverse of passion, which is jealousy. You have a cousin at Calais....’
Katharine moved away from him.
‘Why, God help you, priest,’ she said. ‘Do you think you are the only man that knows that?’
He laughed melodiously, with a great anger.
‘But I am the man that knoweth best how to use my knowledge. Therefore you shall do my will.’
Katharine Howard laughed back at him:
‘Where your lordship’s will marches with mine I will do it,’ she said. ‘But I am main weary of your lordship’s threats. You know the words of Artemidorus?’
Gardiner contained his rage.
‘You will write the letter we have asked you to write?’
She laughed again, and faced him, radiant, fair and flushed in the cheeks.
‘In so far as you beg me to write a letter praying the King of France and the Emperor to abstain from war upon this land, I will write the letter. But, in so far as that helps forward the plotting of you and a knave called Throckmorton, I am main sorry that I must write it.’
The bishop drew back, and uttered:
‘Madam Howard, ye are forward.’
‘Why, God help your lordship,’ she said. ‘Where I see little course for respect I show little. You see I am friends with the King — therefore leave you my cousin be. Because I am friends with the King, who is a man among wolves, I will pray my mistress to indite a letter that shall save this King some troubles. But, if you threaten me with my cousin, or my cousin with me, I will use my friendship with the King as well against you as against any other.’
Gardiner swallowed in his throat, winked his eyes, and muttered:
‘Why, so you do what we will, it matters little in what spirit you shall do it.’
‘So you and my uncle and Throckmorton keep your feet from my paths, you may have my leavings,’ she said. ‘And they will be the larger part, since I ask little for myself.’
He gave her his episcopal blessing as she followed the Lady Mary to her rooms.
Her mind was made up — and she knew that it had been made up hastily, but she was never one to give much time to doubting. She wished these men to leave her out of their plots — but four men are stronger than one woman. Yet, as her philosophy had it, you may make a woman your tool, but she will bend in your hand and strike where she will, for all that. Therefore she must plot, but not with them.
As soon as she could she found the Lady Mary alone, and, setting her valour up against the other’s dark and rigid figure, she spoke rapidly:
She would have her lady write to her friends across the sea that, if Cromwell were ever to fall, they must now stay their hands against the King: they must diminish their bands, discontinue their fortifyings and feign even to quarrel amongst themselves. Otherwise the King must rest firm in his alliance with Cleves, to counterbalance them.
The Lady Mary raised her eyebrows with a show of insolent astonishment that was for all the world like the King’s.
‘You affect my father!’ she said. ‘Is it not a dainty plan?’
Katharine brushed past her words with:
‘It matters little who affects what thing. The main is that Privy Seal must be cast down.’
‘Carthage must be destroyed, O Cato,’ the Lady Mary sneered. ‘Ye are peremptory.’
‘I am as God made me,’ Katharine answered. ‘I am for God’s Church....’ She had a sharp spasm of impatience. ‘Here is a thing to do, and the one and the other snarl like dogs, each for his separate ends.’
‘Oh, la, la,’ the Lady Mary laughed.
‘A Howard is as good as any man,’ Katharine said. Her ingenuous face flushed, and she moved her hand to her throat. ‘God help me: it is true that I swore to be your woman. But it is the true province of your woman to lead you to work for justice and the truth.’
A black malignancy settled upon the face of the princess.
‘I have been called bastard,’ she said. ‘My mother was done to death.’
‘No true man believes you misbegotten,’ Katharine answered hotly.
‘Well, it is proclaimed treason, to speak thus,’ the Lady Mary sneered.
‘Neither can you give your sainted mother her life again.’ Katharine ignored her words. ‘But these actions were not your father’s. It was an ill man forced him to them. The saints be good to you; is it not time to forgive a sad man that would make amends? I would have you to write this letter.’
The Lady Mary’s lips moved into the curves of a tormenting smile.
‘You plead your lover’s cause main well,’ she uttered.
Katharine had another motion of impatience.
‘Your cause I plead main better,’ she said. ‘It is certain that, this man once down, your bastardy should be reversed.’
‘I do not ask it,’ the Lady Mary said.
‘But I ask that you give us peace here, so that the King may make amends to many that he hath sorely wronged. Do you not see that the King inclineth to the Church of God? Do you not see....’
‘I see very plainly that I needs must thank you for better housing,’ Mary answered. ‘It is certain that my father had never brought me from that well at Isleworth, had it not been that he desireth converse with thee at his ease.’
Katharine’s lips parted with a hot anger, but before she could speak the bitter girl said calmly:
‘Oh, I have not said thou art his leman. I know my father. His blood is not hot — but his ears crave tickling. Tickle them whilst thou mayest. Have I stayed thee? Have I sent thee from my room when he did come?’
Katharine cast back the purple hood from over her forehead, she brushed her hand across her brow, and made herself calm.
‘This is a trifling folly,’ she said. ‘In two words: will your Highness write me this letter?’
‘Then, in four words,’ Mary answered, ‘my Highness cares not.’
The mobile brows above Katharine’s blue eyes made a hard straight line.
‘An you will not,’ she brought out, ‘I will leave your Highness’ service. I will get me away to Calais, where my father is.’
‘Why, you will never do that,’ the Lady Mary said; ‘you have tasted blood here.’
Katharine hung her head and meditated for a space.
‘No, before God,’ she said earnestly, ‘I think you judge me wrong. I think I am not as you think me. I think that I do seek no ends of my own.’
The Lady Mary raised her eyebrows and snickered ironically.
‘But of this I am very certain,’ Katharine said. She spoke more earnestly, seeming to plead: ‘If I thought that I were grown a self-seeker, by Mars who changed Alectryon to a cock, and by Pallas Athene who changed Arachne to a spider — if I were so changed, I would get me gone from this place. But here is a thing that I may do. If you will aid me to do it I will stay. If you will not I will get me gone.’
‘Good wench,’ Mary answered, ‘let us say for the sake of peace that thou art honest.... Yet I have sworn by other gods than thine that never will I do aught that shall be of aid, comfort or succour to my father’s cause.’
‘Take back your oaths!’ Katharine cried.
‘For thee!’ Mary said. ‘Wench, thou hast brought me food: thou hast served me in the matter of letters. I might only with great trouble get another so to serve me. But, by Mars and Pallas and all the constellation of the deities, thou mightest get thee to Hell’s flames or ever I would take back an oath.’
‘Oh, madness,’ Katharine cried out. ‘Oh, mad frenzy of one whom the gods would destroy.’ Three times before she had reined in her anger: now she stretched out her hands with her habitual gesture of pitiful despair. Her eyes looked straight before her, and, as she inclined her knees, the folds of her grey dress bent round her on the floor.
‘Here I have pleaded with you, and you have gibed me with the love of the King. Here I have been earnest with you, and you have mocked. God help me!’ she sobbed, with a catch in her throat. ‘Here is rest, peace and the blessing of God offered to this land. Here is a province that is offered back to the Mother of God and the dear hosts of heaven. Here might we bring an erring King back to the right way, a sinful man back unto his God. But you, for a parcel of wrongs of your own....’
‘Now hold thy peace,’ Mary said, between anger and irony. ‘Here is a matter of a farthing or two. Be the letter written, and kiss upon it.’
Katharine stayed herself in the tremor of her emotions, and the Lady Mary said drily:
‘Be the letter written. But thou shalt write it. I have sworn that I will do nothing to give this King ease.’
‘But my writing....’ Katharine began.
‘Thou shalt write,’ Mary interrupted her harshly. ‘If thou wilt have this King at peace for a space that Cromwell may fall, why I am at one with thee. For this King is such a palterer that without this knave at his back I might have had him down ten years ago. Therefore, thou shalt write, and I will countersign the words.’
‘That were to write thyself,’ Katharine said.
‘Good wench,’ the Lady Mary said. ‘I am thy slave: but take what thou canst get.’
Towards six of the next day young Poins clambered in at Katharine Howard’s window and stood, pale, dripping with rain and his teeth chattering, between Cicely Elliott and her old knight.
‘The letter,’ he said. ‘They have taken thy letter. My advancement is at an end!’ And he fell upon the floor.
Going jauntily along the Hampton Street, he had been filled, that afternoon, with visions of advancement. Drifts of rain hid the osiers across the river and made the mud ooze in over the laces of his shoes. The tall white and black house, where the Emperor’s ambassador had his lodgings, leaned in all its newness over the path, and the water from its gutters fell right into the river, making a bridge above a passer’s head. The little cookshop, with its feet, as it were, in the water, made a small hut nestling down beneath the shadow of the great house. It was much used by Chapuys’ grooms, trencher boys and javelin men, because the cook was a Fleming, and had a comfortable hand in stewing eels.
